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JoJo: The St. Regis Bangkok
Since 1904 when John Jacob Astor IV built the first St. Regis Hotel on Fifth Avenue in New York City, the St. Regis hostelries have been noted not only for the quality of their accommodations, but also the innovative, high standards of their restaurants. When we heard the newly opened St. Regis Bangkok was going to have an Italian restaurant, we immediately asked ourselves how the fabled St. Regis was going to create something elegantly innovative in Rachaprasong. The area already contained several excellent Italian restaurants.
After a visit to JoJo, we discovered that there is still room for innovation and quality in the Bangkok Italian dining sweepstakes. JoJo is innovative and offers an exhilarating Italian dining experience not found elsewhere in the city.
The lynchpin of JoJo's concept is quality ingredients. “Our restaurant is all about the best ingredients,” says Massimo Zaretti, restaurant manager. “We let them speak for themselves with dishes that highlight their qualities.”
He was right. Although virtually every Italian restaurant in town talks about the high quality of their ingredients, they really do make an impact at JoJo. The Fettuccine Afredo, for example, is served by tossing the hot fettuccine atop a wheel of Castelmagno cheese, a Piedmont specialty with its origins reaching back to before the 13th century. The cheese coats the pasta as it is tossed, creating a dish that is simple, but sublime and driven by the quality of the ingredients.
The Italians take their cheese seriously and many of them are given Protected Geographical Status, an EU system that protects the names and establishes standards for products, including cheese. JoJo has 31 of these Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) cheeses in its larder, an astounding number that to our knowledge is not even remotely matched in Bangkok. Five of these cheeses are selected every day to be served, accompanied by honey, on a special platter.
Equally impressive are the numerous extra-virgin olive oils, balsamic vinegars and premium Italian hams and cold cuts. The scope and quality of what is on offer is really remarkable and far exceeds what is on offer at most Italian restaurants in Italy.
JoJo has yet to have its 'hard opening', but when it does it will be open for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Although it has yet to open for breakfast, we are looking forward to when it is available. One of life's great pleasures is standing at a counter in Italy while enjoying a hot glass of coffee with milk and a bit of pastry or hunk ciabatta before confronting work or a day of sightseeing and shopping. At JoJo there are high tables and a 20-seat bar near the entrance where coffee and pastry will be served to those getting ready to confront the rigors of life in Bangkok. We can't wait!
At lunch the restaurant has a la carte dining, including some smashing pizzas, and a 'Pranzo' set lunch of two courses for 690 baht or three courses for 740 baht. There is also a great selection of pastas, including a wonderful rendition of Spinach ricotta ravioli served with tomato and rocket drops at 600 baht.
Dinner time is when JoJo becomes chic and serious, a place where dedicated diners saddle up to the table to enjoy items from the extensive a la carte menu. We started with a 350 baht Caprese salad of buffalo mozzarella, plum tomato and basil. This is a good yardstick for measuring an Italian restaurant as it is something that is served virtually everywhere. Predictably, it was the ingredients that made this dish standout – great imported mozzarella and some superb olive oil. For those with large appetites, the signature 950 baht Antipasto da JoJo with a selection of cold cuts and cheese, including a scrumptious Burrata, is a delight.
For our main course, we tried the 820 baht Veal ossobucco with saffron rice cream and creamolata; it was good, but not exceptional as the veal had been slightly overcooked. Other items that looked intriguing were a traditional Veal chop Milanese with pesto mash and rocket salad and Truffle scallops served celeriac mash and artichoke chips.
We finished our dining experience with the 450 baht Chocolate experience with hot chocolate fondant, dark chocolate ice cream and Gianduiotto flakes, a decadently rich combination that we all enjoyed and had our tongues wagging for days.
The extraordinary food at JoJo is matched by an extraordinary selection of wines befitting a restaurant found in a St. Regis hotel. Although Italian wines dominate, there are intriguing selections in all price categories from the world's major wine producing areas. The service, although the restaurant has only been open a short time, was informed, friendly and extremely efficient
JoJo proves that there is still room for innovation and quality in the Bangkok Italian restaurant dining scene. The quality of its ingredients when combined with the exacting standards of the St. Regis make this a restaurant worth adding to anyone's selection of fine dining spots in the city of Bangkok.
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